Every step I take away from the private jet feels like a knife is being stabbed into my chest. My words shattered Roxanne, she broke down in front of me, yet I still walked away.
I don’t have a choice. I can’t be who she needs me to be and protect her at the same time. She craves a monster, a bastard, a man who’d rather destroy her than have her ever believe she deserves better than him, but I need to be more than that.
I need to be the lowest of the low, the scum on the bottom of a seedy one-star motel shower stall, the man my father raised me to be. I need to rain terror down on those who have done me wrong and resurrect the innocent I burned along the way.
And I need to start with her.
Megan’s eyes are as red-rimmed as Roxanne’s. They’re puffy like she’s been crying, but not a touch of moisture is seen on her cheeks. She’s scared she is about to meet with her maker but considering that couldn’t occur until I broke her out of a mental hospital alters her perspective on things. She isn’t close to being free, her wings are fully clipped, but it’s better than being dead.
It’s the same with Theresa. As much as I want her to be the villain of my story, that isn’t a title I can give her just yet. She shared information with me tonight I couldn’t have gotten elsewhere. Undeniable evidence that will have Roxanne returned to my bed even quicker than I’m hoping.
That alone will spare Theresa of my fury. It isn’t a lifetime guarantee, but bearing in mind the many ways I had planned to kill her when her overzealous hands had Roxanne acting out, she should count her lucky stars. If she hadn’t spilled a vault load of my father’s secrets the past four hours, she would have been wearing concrete boots by now, and Rocco would be guzzling down saltwater right along with her. That’s how much my blood boiled watching Roxanne and Rocco get cozy and how tenacious my itch to kill was.
It’s just fortunate for them both, my wish to return Roxanne to her rightful spot at my side was greater than my urge to slit their throats.
It was a fucking hard feat—one I’m still struggling to maintain.
After sliding into the back of a prototype vehicle, I signal for the driver to go. We have a long trip ahead of us, and I want it done before Fien wakes. Since that’s usually right at dawn, I better get a wiggle on.
“Do you recognize any of these people?” I remove a stack of licenses Smith printed when the drugs tracing through Theresa’s veins couldn’t stop the waggle of her tongue before twisting them to face Megan. “Whether in your family or outside of it.”
I can’t believe I’m playing into Theresa’s suggestion Megan and I are related. The Petretti genes are strong, and Megan looks nothing like me. Her hair is mousy, her teeth are chipped and crooked, and her eyes are hazel. And don’t get me started on the fact she’s batshit crazy, or we’ll be here all night.
I’m fucked in the head, but I’m not mentally challenged.
“I won’t hurt these people, Megan. I just want answers.” I’m such a fucking liar. If any of the thoughts running through my head are true, all these men are dead, then I’ll move for their families like Clover is hunting Maestro’s now. He broke the rules when he touched Roxanne, and now his entire existence will pay the price of his stupidity. I wasn’t lying when I said I’d remove a man’s legacy if he hurt Roxanne. I don’t play games when it comes to people I love.
I work my jaw side to side to loosen its grip when Megan asks, “Are you from the hotel?” Her voice is as weak as the fragile mouse she’s portraying, exposing I need to play on her insecurities. If she’s a damsel in distress, I need to pretend I’m a hero. It’s like good cop, bad cop, everyone has their role.
I unbutton my jacket before sinking into my seat, hopeful a blasé response will show Megan I mean her no harm. I don’t even have a gun on my hip. It’s stuffed down the back of my trousers, but that’s not the point. “I don’t own any hotels, but why would you ask that? Are you having trouble with some people at your hotel? I can help you with it if you’d like.”
She licks her cracked lips before twisting them so they match her screwed-up nose. “They’re okay. They are justreallyannoying.” The woman seated across from me would have to be mid-twenties at least, but she speaks as if she hasn’t reached her teen years yet, furthering my proof she isn’t a Petretti. Even when it could fuck her sideways, Ophelia was fierce.
After scooting to the edge of her seat, Megan drops her eyes to the stack of licenses. “Can I look through them?”
“Sure.” I smile at her like she asked to suck my dick before handing over the pile of papers. It is stupid of me to do. She’s more scared now than she was when Preacher snuck her out of a mental facility with a hessian bag pulled over her head and his hand clamped around her mouth. From what I heard from Smith, more than Preacher’s hand is suffering bite wounds.
I join Megan in balancing on the end of my seat when she says, “The staff asks about him all the time. I don’t like talking about him.” When she swivels on the spot, it dawns on me that the heat on her cheeks has nothing to do with the heat pumping out of the vents. “Nick, though… I talk about him all the time. Have you seen him lately?” She stops, huffs, then folds her arms in front of her chest. “He wasn’t withher, was he? I tried to fix his mistake. I gave her the drink like the man said. It didn’t work.Shestill had her baby.”
Her jump in and out of personalities gives me whiplash, but I attempt to maintain the momentum of our conversation. “What man, Megan?” I’ve shown her over a dozen images. She needs to narrow down the list of suspects for me.
She appears more innocent than insane when she brings her father’s identification card to the front of the stack. Carlyle Shroud looks like a cruel, villainous man incapable of raising a rat, much less a daughter whose mother died before she reached womanhood.
“Your father gave you something to hurt a woman?” I sound like a fucking moron, but mercifully, it seems to be a language Megan understands.
“Not my daddy, silly.” She laughs like I’m hilarious. “He is who the men in the white coats at the hotel asked about all the time.”
“The hotel you just left?” I ask, finally clueing on to what she means. She has confused the mental hospital she was admitted in the past week with the Ritz Carlton. It makes sense when you see the conditions she grew up in. A pigsty would be glamorous compared to her family ranch.
While nodding, Megan pulls a second photo out of the stack like she isn’t about to unlock the treasure chest I’ve been hoarding the past almost two years. “He gave me the medication.” She holds up an outdated photo of Rimi Castro in front of me—the once ringleader of the baby-farming syndicate who kidnapped my wife, held my daughter captive, and killed my unborn child. He’s dead, so I can’t get the answers I need from him. Megan, though, she’s very much alive and very much on my radar.
“How long ago did you meet with Rimi?”
She takes a moment to contemplate. Her delay reveals she isn’t as stupid as she wants me to believe. She’s playing an act. I’m confident of that.
Don’t get me wrong, she’s fucking mental, but she could be a genius if her evil was harnessed the right way.
Once she’s confident she has me on tenterhooks, she answers, “Last week.”
